Shana Galen Read Online Free Page A

needed was a servant reporting that Baron Keating had attacked him on the night of the ball. He stepped out of the room and closed the door behind him, hoping the man would awake before he was found.
    If the man in black hadn’t followed him upstairs, he must still be downstairs. With the Ramsgates’ guests.
    With Elinor.
    Damn it! He raced back down the stairs, wishing he’d faced the man down in the gardens, instead of bringing an armed attacker into the same ball as his wife and his friends—well, her friends.
    Idiot. Crow would never have allowed him to make such a foolish error in judgment. But then Crow was dead, and it was his own foolish error that had been responsible for that too.
    Winn had the presence of mind to ease open the servants’ door and check that the corridor outside was empty before exiting. He then made his way back toward the ballroom. He passed several people he knew, but the grim expression on his face did not invite conversation. When he reached the ballroom again, he could not stop his gaze from seeking Elinor. She was still waltzing with the puppy, and now that Winn had the man in black to deal with, there wasn’t a bloody thing he could do to stop it. There wasn’t any bloody way he could even move close to her. And he wanted to be close to her. Desperately. When had she become a beauty? Had she always possessed that figure?
    Winn tore his gaze from her daring red gown and surveyed the room. There. The man in black was standing near the orchestra. Winn started for him, and the man moved toward the French doors, slipping outside. It was a trap, and Winn knew it. He also knew he had little choice but to follow. As he paused just inside the French doors, staring at the moonlit paving stones marking the path into the garden, the waltz ended, and he heard the announcement for supper. He stood aside while the couples, who had been enjoying the early autumn evening, strolled inside, and then he slipped into the darkness.
    He had a fleeting thought for Elinor—whom she would sit with at supper—but he couldn’t afford to lose focus on the mission.
    His focus saved him. The large earthenware vase shattered against the wall just to the right of his ear. Before Winn could blink, the man in black collided with him. Winn went down, rolling once so he was on top of the assailant. But the man had the momentum and rolled him back over. The assailant reared back and punched Winn hard across the cheek. Winn squinted, knowing it would leave a mark.
    “Give me the key,” the man in black demanded. Did he have a slight French accent? Winn’s ears were ringing too loudly for a definitive answer.
    “You’ll have to take it off my dead body.”
    The man smiled. “If you insist.” He pulled the pistol from his greatcoat, but Winn grabbed the barrel before the assailant had time to aim. For several moments, the two men struggled for possession of the pistol, and then Winn knocked it free, and the weapon slid across the paving stones with a clatter. Winn watched the pistol skid to a stop against a large pot like the one the assailant had thrown at him, and then both men dove for it.
    The man in black reached it first, but Winn grasped the man’s ankle and hauled him back. He punched him, his right hand glancing across the man’s cheek. The assailant stumbled, and Winn grasped his coat and hauled him upright. “Whom do you work for?”
    The assailant smiled in response and threw a punch. Winn ducked, but it sent both men off balance, and they stumbled down the wide, low steps leading to the garden. At the bottom, they tumbled onto the grass, and Winn got another punch in before the assailant boxed his ears. They rolled, the branches of a shrub slicing at Winn’s face.
    Suddenly, the man in black stiffened. And Winn looked up.
    Voices.
    As of one accord, both men ducked back down into the shadows of the hedgerows and ceased moving. Winn still held the collar of the man in black’s greatcoat, and the